Pages

Monday, 19 January 2009

Spring is on her way............

The days are lightening perceptibly now; I don't need to shut up the hens and feed the goats until about 5pm now, it's really heartening! Still a bit of winter to go, and the weather people forecast a really cold blast in February, but I'll deal with that when it happens.

In the meantime, these little beauties are out on the kitchen windowsill

SACK THE GARDENER!!!

I haven't really got a gardener LOL. MrL has taken it upon himself, with my approval, of course, to do some "cutting back" in the front garden. I'll admit there was a bit of pruning and tidying to do, but I quite like it a bit wild and woolly............... In his enthusiasm he has removed my viburnum shrub - the one with the snowball flowers on, and yesterday he dug up a rare rose that *HE* paid 18.00 for on a special order at a specialist rose nursery for me ( should have seen his face when I told him that bit!!) Sadly, the viburnums eems to have been burned or whatever, so I need to get another one and replant in exactly the same place - I could see it from the kitchen window and it had just found it feet and was starting to flower well. I managed to wrest the green rose from the wheel barrow, bit mangled, but with a flower attached - not bad for through the winter. I can't remember its Latin name offhand, but the flower is green tinged with red and I think it's pretty in an exhuberent, eccentric sort of way, although probably not everyone's idea of a rose, ot to everyone's taste! It comes from China originally, but Cranborne Manor were kind enough to order one in for me, and I then had an excuse to visit their rather lovely garden centre, didn't I?

1 comment:

Oh dear, your husband sounds just like mine! My OH is banned from touching our garden, except under strict supervision. He is allowed up the allotment and last year I left him in control of the potatoes. The result ... he killed them off! I still can't understand how! Hope your rose survives. I planted a snowball bush in my garden, 2 years ago, but sadly it didn't flower last year.

Welcome to my blog

Open on my lap

This is an uncopyrighted blog!

I'm happy to share freely whatever is posted up here on Unbought Delicacies - feel free to copy and share recipes, patterns, my pictures, tips, etc - I really don't mind, and like to think that my advice and experiences learned over the years is being shared with a wider audience. If there's anything I don't want copied or shared, it won't appear here.

This is me............

I have found such joy

I have found such joy in simple things;A plain, clean room, a nut-brown loaf of bread,A cup of milk, a kettle as it sings,The shelter of a roof above my head,And in a leaf-laced square along the floor,Where yellow sunlight glimmers through the door.I have found such joy in things that fillMy quiet days: a curtain's blowing grace,A potted plant upon my window sill,A rose, fresh-cut and placed within a vase;A table cleared, a lamp beside a chair,And books I long have loved beside me there.Oh, I have found such joys I wish I mightTell every woman who goes seeking farFor some elusive, feverish delight,That very close to home the great joys are:The elemental things- old as the race,Yet never, through the ages, commonplace.

Handmade books, personalised printed notepaper and envelopes.Hamper of bits and bobs from the above lists, packed in a pretty lined basket.

I'll add some more as and when I think of them; These can be used all year round and easily tailored to the recipient - everyone loves a homemade gift. :)

Currently on the needles

Autumn leaves scarf

Crochet blanket/s

Shetland Fairisle kits

Dishcloths

Wartime Farm Fairisle top

Inspiring thoughts.............

I saw a man, an old Cilician, who occupied an acre or two of land that no one wanted.A patch not worth the ploughing, unrewarding for flocks, unfit for vineyards;he, however, by planting here and there among the scrub cabbages or white lilies and verbena and flimsy poppies, fancied himself a king in wealth, and coming home late in the evening, loaded his board with unbought delicacies.Virgil

I had no theories to prove. I merely wanted to try living by my own hands, independently as far as possible from a system of division of labour in which the participant loses most of the pleasure of making and growing things for himself. I wanted to bring in my own fuel and smell its sweet smell as it burned in the hearth I had made. I wanted to grow my own food, or forage after it. In short I wanted to do as much as I could for myself, because I had already realised from partial experience the inexpressible joy of doing so.